Finger Prints
by Stephaniiie
Summary: “She said that they’ll always be right here with me.” Caroline clasped her hand over her chest and smiled a little at me. “And Tyler’s with you too, Ally, I know he is.”" Ally & Caroline talk about Tyler. Set after the movie. One-shot.


**Disclaimer- **All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. No copyright infringement is intended.

**A/N- I'm English so when I say purse I mean… purse/wallet, not bag. Just a little advance warning ;)**

**Finger prints**

"_**If you could hear me, I would say that our finger prints don't fade from the lives we touch"- Tyler Hawkins**_

**Ally POV**

Death is a funny thing.

Funny as in strange. Not the laughing kind of funny.

When someone close to you dies, you don't think that it's possible that _anyone_ can experience the same kind of pain that you're going through. No one nowhere can possibly feel this… this… gut-wrenching _agony_. The way I felt when I heard the gunshot in the subway more than ten long years ago. The way I felt when I realised what had happened; that Tyler wasn't going to come back.

But every resident of New York knew someone that had died that day. Even if it was their dog's sister's Mum's owner, they knew someone. But even if you didn't know the person all that well (like the dog example), you still couldn't believe that they were gone for good.

But they were.

He was.

I sighed and threaded the daisy neatly through the hole I had made in the stem of another. The stupid weeds weren't good for anything else. The breeze blew lightly through the trees, the winds long fingers combing through my messy, blonde hair and blowing it over my eyes. "Give over," I muttered, pushing my hair back.

"What are you doing?"

I jumped and looked up at the owner of the voice. "Oh. Hey Caroline." I gestured to my daisy chain. "Making… daisy chains."

Caroline bobbed her head in a nod, as though she understood why I'd sit here, leaning against a gravestone making daisy chains at twilight. Yeah. Totally normal.

"Wanna join me?" I offered, patting the ground next to me.

Her dark brows furrowed over her almond-shaped eyes as she thought about it. Then, she pushed her bike over to the cherry blossom tree and leant it up against the trunk before coming and sitting down next to me. She plucked a strand of grass from the ground, and rubbed it between her fingers for a moment. Then she looked up at me and said, "Do you… do this a lot? The daisy thing, I mean."

I shrugged. "From time to time."

"Do you think Tyler liked daisy chains?"

I cocked my head to the side and thought about that. "Do _you_ think he did?"

Caroline looked at the delicate flowers in my hand, and then nodded slowly. "I think he'd like them if you did." She smiled cheekily. "I think he'd like what you like."

"Yeah, I can see that," I said with a smile, plucking another daisy from the ground and tying it to the line I already had.

The girl next to me reached up and took the smooth pebble off the top of the gravestone then. She turned it over and over in her hands, deep in thought about something.

I had that urge to make conversation, but held my tongue out of respect. After all, it had taken a fair few months for me to get in the right frame of mind to have a normal conversation with someone. So I carried on silently making my daisy chains.

"Why are you here?" Caroline asked after a moment.

I lifted my eyes to meet her gaze. "Um… to… say hi to your brother, I guess."

"Mum says you don't have to be here to speak to him. She said that Tyler and Michael are everywhere all the time, kinda like God." Caroline reached up and put the pebble back on the stone behind her. "She said that they'll always be right here with me." She clasped her hand over her chest and smiled a little at me. "And Tyler's with you too, Ally, I know he is."

I smiled back. "I know."

"So why did you come all the way here to say hi? He can hear you where you are too."

I knew that Caroline wasn't a child. I knew that she had grown up a lot since her brother had died, even though she had already been pretty mature. But she still had that beautiful outlook on the world that only children could ever have. The simple ideas. And her naivety was so endearing. I looked back down at my short fingers when I answered her question. "Because… it's nicer to come here. Tyler's more real here than he is halfway across the country. Here, it doesn't feel as though… it doesn't feel like he's slipping through my fingers."

"Does it feel like that at your university?" Her voice was quiet, as though she wasn't sure whether it was polite to ask such a question.

I had transferred to a different university at the start of the school year. I had said that the new university had a better course for my final year but that was only part of the reason. Really, I needed to escape from New York. Just for a while. I had to see some more of the world; you never knew what could happen tomorrow. "Sometimes," I admitted in a small voice. "Sometimes I forget."

Caroline was quiet for a moment. "Sometimes I forget too," she whispered eventually. She sounded ashamed.

"It's not a bad thing," I told her. "Tyler wouldn't want you to sit around and miss him all the time. He would want you to be happy."

"I know. But… if I do forget him…" she trailed off, and left the sentence to hang in the evening breeze.

I dug around in my pocket and brought out my phone and my purse. Then, I opened up the camera app on my phone. "Caroline," I said softly.

She looked up, and I snapped a quick picture of her. Then she frowned. "What are you doing?"

"Here." I handed her my phone, which was displaying the photo I had just taken. Then I opened my purse and took out the photo I always kept on me. I held that up next to the phone display. "Look at the similarities," I said softly.

Caroline's brow furrowed ever so slightly and then she looked at me. "He was my brother; of course I look like him."

"So?"

"So what's your point?"

I smiled. "You'll never lose Tyler, Caroline. Just like Tyler never lost Michael." I pressed the tip of my index finger to her chest. "Your Mum was right. He's right in there. And you never forget what you keep in there. Just because he's not at the front of your mind doesn't mean you've forgotten him. I know I'll never forget."

Caroline nodded slightly, looking back between the two pictures. Then, she very deliberately deleted the photo of her. "That wasn't a very nice photo." She exited the app, and then smiled at my screensaver. "_That's_ a nice photo."

I mumbled an agreement as she handed me my phone back. My screensaver had been the same now for a year and a half. Longer, maybe. It was of Tyler and I, just a few days before he… you know. Before then, I had never liked to keep things the same. Life was about variety wasn't it? My screensaver had changed every few days but now… now I couldn't let go of that one picture. I cleared my throat awkwardly, and slipped the photo of Tyler back into my purse before changing the subject. "How's your new school?"

Caroline scowled. "How's your new university?" Her tone was thick with sarcasm.

I laughed. "That bad, huh?"

She sighed and reluctantly said, "It's not so bad. My art teacher entered me in a competition last term and I won it. Dad came to the award ceremony." A smile pulled up the corners of her mouth. "And he took me for dinner afterwards with my friends."

I felt a smile light my face in response. "That was nice of him."

"Yeah." Caroline looked at me then. "Do you think…?" She stopped.

"Sure, I think all the time," I joked.

She poked her tongue out at me. "No. Do you think Tyler really can hear us? Do you think there's, like, better reception here?"

I bit back a laugh at her analogy. "I think he can hear us anywhere. If he wants to."

"Yeah. I think so too." She looked up at the sky, which was slowly darkening in colour. "I should probably go home soon. Mum doesn't know I came here."

"Okay," I said.

She licked her lips and then got to her feet. "Um… it was nice to see you again…"

"Yeah, you too."

Caroline went and got her bike from where it stood against the tree. Then, she gave me a little wave and got on the bike.

I waved back and then looked back down at the daisy chain in my hand, which now made a full circle. Then I stood up. "Caroline!" I called after her. "Caroline, wait."

She stopped and turned back, coming slowly back to my side, before slipping off of the bike. "Yeah?"

"Here. Have this." I slipped the circle of daisies over her head like a necklace. "Daisy necklaces are the best kind of jewellery around."

She giggled. "Thank you."

"Can I have a picture?" I asked, gesturing to my phone.

She hesitated.

"How about both of us in it together?"

"Okay," Caroline agreed warily.

I went to her side and slipped my arm around her middle, turning my phone around and taking a photo of the both of us. Then I turned the phone back towards us and showed it to her.

Her eyes widened ever so slightly. "What…?" Then she blinked, looked behind her, and her face fell a bit. "Oh. Never mind." She looked down at Tyler's grave, and then hooked the daisy necklace off of her neck. She put it on top of the pebble she had left there and smiled at me. "I think it suits him better."

I laughed with her. "Fair enough."

She got back on the bike. "See you later Ally."

"Yeah. Maybe I'll come visit sometime. When I'm on holiday from Uni."

"Mum would like that," Caroline said, and then she waved again, and cycled off.

I watched her go, and then I looked back down at the photo I had taken. Then, I felt my eyes widen in the same way that Caroline's had. Behind the two of us, was a very familiar-looking face. He was smiling, looking directly into the camera.

"Tyler…?" I breathed, whipping around. I felt my heart sink when I saw nothing there, but, really, what else had I expected? I looked back at the photo, but this time I only saw my and Caroline's smiling faces. The way it was supposed to be.

I shook my head at myself, and then went to put my phone back in my pocket. But my fingers acted of their own accord, opening the options and setting the new photo as my screensaver. I hadn't expected letting go to be so easy.

But I hadn't let go, I knew that. Like I had told Caroline, Tyler would always be there in my heart.

I traced the lettering on the gravestone lightly with the tip of my index finger. "I guess I'll see you later."

I paused, as though waiting for a reply. Then, I snorted and kissed my fingertip before pressing it back on the cold stone. It left a little mark; a dirty fingerprint on the smooth, black rock. I didn't bother to wipe it off. It was proof that I had been here.

And I knew Tyler wouldn't mind.

**~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~X~**

**Yeah… not too sure where that came from but we'll go with it lol. I had meant to write a Twilight one-shot to get rid of some writers block but this was what happened instead.**

**Oh and I just want to say that since I live in the UK, I have a pretty limited knowledge of schools, colleges and universities over in the states. So if Ally would really have graduated from Uni last year or something then… well, can you go with it for me? Haha lol sorry :)**

**I hope it was okay… what with stepping out of my comfort zone and all… But I just couldn't resist :)**

**I have only seen this film once (though I fully intend to go again) and wow I didn't expect it to be so amazing! Incredible cast, incredible acting and incredible storyline… I couldn't get it out of my head so hence this random one-shot :)**

**Please, please tell me what you thought. Was it really awful?**

**Thanks for reading and (hopefully) reviewing! :D**

**Steph**


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